# anonymity in moos

Christopher Scott Delaney (cdelaney@indiana.edu)
Fri, 12 Apr 1996 18:44:40 PDT

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    J-,

    An interesting example to note, although it might not be a proper analogy
    in context, is the WorldMOO example.  Sometime before it closed the
    archwiz decided to make .email_address +r.  The players, and quite a few
    wizards had a fit.  Some proggers even quickly made a listing of them all
    and offered to sell them.  One of the reasons, as I recall, given by the
    archwiz at the time was that, "Hey, it isn't a gurantee, the only reason
    every other MOO does it is because Lambda does it and/or because the core
    ships that way" (paraphrase).  It did pose an interesting situation
    though for all involved.  (This isn't a world slam btw...just an example).

    The difference here seems to be that you are giving the players a voice
    in the decision, which is good.  Some of the concerns that come to mind
    howerver are:  What happens when suddenly anonymity is lost?  What means
    of protection are left for the would-be ingrate that logs in just to
    harass, especially when a line such as rl email (is that an oxymoron? :)
    harassment cannot be stopped by wizardly intervention such as toading and
    newting, or color listing of the harasser's connect sites?  While
    everyone (should be) taught that logging onto anything through the
    "internet" implies a certain risk of information being made publically
    available, MOO's in the past have seemed to try to preserve as much of
    the "player"'s RL identity as possible.

    I think what it all boils down to is "what purpose would it serve" to
    make that information available.  With a lot of players having multiple
    e-mail accounts and connect sites, the threat of losing one of them or
    more doesn't seem to ominous.  Especially on MOOs with open player
    creation when a problem person can just create a new one from a spare
    account.  Perhaps making it player settable?  Ah well, just a few
    ramblings, but I hope you post the results of this to the list.